Needless to say these ramblings are personal reflections and do not in any way represent official policy of the Fédération Protestante de France, my employer, nor of the churches I'm a minister of, the United Reformed Church and the Eglise Réformée de France.

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2008 was the international year of languages, the international year of the potato and the year for the protection of the frog. 2009 is the international year of reconciliaiton, the international year of astronomy, the Calvin year, the St Paul year and no doubt much more besides. Enjoy it all.2010 was the UN year of biodiversity and the year of the 100th anniversary of the Edinburgh mission conference2011 is the international year of forests - protect the trees and plant some folks!

Thursday, 21 January 2010

Dr B was taken to hospital last night. In fact he ended up being taken to two hospitals. First by our local pompiers to St Julien en Genevois in France, that time I got to sit with him in the ambulance. Then, about an hour after a very frightening incident of his heart stopping to work, he was driven in another ambulance to the Genevan cantonal hospital and I managed to go after him in a taxi.At about 4am I was allowed to go and speak to him. He looked alot better by then and was rather chattier than might be expected given the time of the night. In classic Dr B mode he said the one thing I could do for him was to sort out the stuff relating to the forthcoming German version of his Phd! So romantic! The rest of our conversation seemed to resemble a rather bad American movie of the kind I despise most, with us looking into each others eyes and saying I love youThe Swiss doctors think he has viral pericarditus (inflamation of the sack that contains the heart), the French doctors think there might be something more. He's bleeding, he's tired but he is alive and for that the tears falling onto my keyboard give thanks.At Karin's ordination, and also 10 days ago when our new general secretary began his time in office by preaching, we heard these wonderful words from the book of the prophet Isaiah:Do not fear, for I have redeemed you; I have called you by name, you are mine. When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you;when you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you. Because you are precious in my sight, and honoured, and I love you ...

This evening before I go to bed I think about how precious the one I love is to me. I think of the tens of thousands in Haiti who are not as lucky as I am to get their loved ones to good health care easily. Not because God cares less for them than for Dr Bbut because human beings across the world have still not caught up with God's standards of justice for all not just for the privileged. We have not been faithful enough to the practicalities of the idea that each of is is precious for God the creator.Stephen I pray that you will get well. People of Haiti I pray for justice, liberation and tangible hope for you all. We are all precious in teh sight of a loving God.In the meantime I give heartfelt thanks that one of the tags I shall file this under will be "life".

5 Comments:

Your blog is often wise and inspiring Jane, but tonight it brings comfort too, while reminding of the terrible injustices that still prevail in our broken world. In my heart, along with the people of Haiti, I also have you and Stephen.

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About Me

Jane

My name is Jane Stranz. I was born and brought up in Britain and am an ordained minister of the United Reformed Church, a small non-conformist church. For over 10 years I worked as a parish minister in the Eglise Réformée de France in Dunkerque, Chambéry and Ferney-Voltaire. Fom July 2002 to October 2011 I led the language service of the World Council of Churches in Geneva. Currently I'm working on a two year mission on ecumenical relations, inter-religious dialogue and inter-cultural ministry with the Fédération Protestante de France based in Paris. It's going to be exciting and a steep learning curve. I'm married to Stephen Brown a journalist, researcher and theologian who works at Gobethics.net. Over the next two years we'll see how we manage a commuting marriage between Paris and Ferney Voltaire. Since 1999 I've been living with multiple sclerosis, sounds rather noble but really means I just live in denial and inject interferon b three times a week and count myself very lucky to live in a country with a great health care system.